Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method for identifying at least one electrically powered device by a power supply device via a powerline connection, preferably for execution with a system.
The present invention also relates to an electrically powered device for identifying with a power supply device, comprising a powerline socket for connecting the electrically powered device via a powerline connection to a core power supply, a core device for performing an intended application of the electrically powered device and an identity sender.
The invention further relates to a power supply device for identifying an electrically powered device, comprising a powerline socket for connecting the power supply device to a powerline, and an identity receiver for receiving a unique identifier of the electrically powered device via the powerline connection.
The present invention also relates to a power distribution unit and to a system for identifying at least one electrically powered device by a power supply device via a powerline connection, preferably for performing a method.
Description of the Related Art
Although the present invention is applicable to various electrically powered devices the present invention will be described in the following with regard to household appliances, entertainment devices, communication devices and their energy management.
The steady increase of energy costs for energy provided, in particular via powerlines for electrically powered devices, requires, in order to partially reduce costs, energy management systems that may monitor and/or control energy consumption of electrically powered devices. Such energy management systems may monitor a potentially large number of electrically powered devices. Every single electrically powered device must therefore be identifiable by the energy management system in order to know precisely which energy consumption of which electrically powered device is actually monitored or measured. Further if the energy management system shall not only monitor but also control each electrically powered device for device management the energy management system must be able to issue control commands to controllers for connecting or disconnecting an electrically powered device from the power supply.
Conventional electrically powered devices, for example household appliances like refrigerators, etc.; entertainment devices, like television; or communication devices, like telephones or the like are not able to communicate that they are associated with a certain energy measuring device or with a controller of an energy management system. The reason is that conventional electrically powered devices are not able to recognize, for example, the electrical socket they are plugged in. To overcome this problem manual intervention is performed, where each new association between an electrically power device and its corresponding measuring device and/or power switch or controller is manually entered into the energy management system and updated whenever necessary. However, this method has certain drawbacks. One of the disadvantages is that manually entering associations will eventually lead to inconsistencies in the set of associations since in large systems the effort to keep up with all the associations is not feasible. This may lead to, for example, a turning off of devices which should not be switched off like devices which are still in use, or to a switching on although the corresponding device is not needed.